Monday 25 January 2021

Random Ramblings :: A bit of this and that

Hi there everyone πŸ˜€

Well ... after it feeling like there's not really that much happening over here, somehow there seems to have been a fair few bits of random happening over the last few weeks that feel worth rambling about ...

A brand new project ... 
This Art Class in a Box appeared randomly on my Facebook timeline a few weeks ago and I had some Christmas money that I wanted to use to treat myself to something, rather than it just fall into the normal household bills pot ...

What drew me to this one, daft as it sounds, was the colours ... purple is my most favourite colour ever and I really felt that if I could pull off any of these projects they would make a good addition to the 'art wall' that I am hoping to pull together at some point this year ... this is a photo from their website, so I can't claim the credit ...

I've never really painted before so goodness only knows how it will all turn out, but time will tell. For now here is a sneak peak in the box ... 

Searching for Angels ...
One day a couple of weeks ago we managed to take dad out for a walk round our local town and castle grounds. We are so lucky to have this right on our doorstep ...



Our primary objective was searching for 'Angels' ... part of a local art project that has seen pairs of 'Angels' Wings' pop up around the town ...

A bit of gentle decluttering ...
Inspired by other blogs I’ve read there was a little bit of clearing of clutter belonging to my imaginary self ... the imaginary self that needs a big black leather laptop bag and a fabulous pair of heels ...

I am currently deciding whether I can justify sending to a local charity shop or whether to try and sell on Ebay, which is not without effort, but I feel as though I should try and recoup something for the initial layout.

Our first foray ...
There has been a very short initial foray out back ... to take down the tangle of the cobea from the arbour ...

In other cobea news, under the expert advice of Monty Don, we had hoped to collect seeds so we could grow them again this year.

In spite of the cobea giving a fantastic show through late summer and autumn there were only two fat juicy seed pods that developed ...
We left them until December before taking them off the plant and opened one to find ...

... seeds, but not developed at all.

We thought we’d have a go at popping the other one in the airing cupboard to see what happened and then pretty much forgot about it ... until a few days ago.

Well ... it had crisped up lovely and started to split and look ...

The top left picture is the original seeds that we bought ... top right is in flower ... bottom left is the crispy seedpod and bottom left are the seeds we collected ... so that seems pretty successful.

They can be planted in February to that is a job that has definitely been added to the priority list,

More cupcakes ...
This time of the 'Skinny' variety ... totally made unskinny by a generous dollop of full fat and sugary buttercream ... they were ok, but nowhere near as good as something made from scratch with proper sugar and butter ...

Flowers by post ...
These were delivered by post last week ... from some of our closest friends ... and what a treat ...


Plenty of weather ...
A smattering of snow ...


... and after a lot of wet, gloom and grey a bit of random blue sky and even some gentle warm sunshine ...

A virtual dinner party ...
On Saturday night we had our first ever virtual dinner party with our good friends Jackie & Phil. We have got together for Saturday nights at home with good food for as many years as I can remember and we've all really missed it over the last 12 months, so we thought we'd give this a go. I will let you know how we got on next week πŸ˜ƒ

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4 comments:

  1. Ah, I'm not the only with one with a catchup post. Love the look of your art class in a box. I've only ever painted at school & that was a long time ago & you've got some lovely walks on your doorstep. The cupcakes look nice & so decorative which I don't do these days to cut down on the sweeter side. Everyone is showing snow! I can do rain today after sweltering yesterday & the weather seems strange everywhere at the moment. I'm interested in how your virtual dinner party goes as I've no knowledge of social media, except my blog. Hope it goes well, take care & stay safe.

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    1. There are so many small things that happen that are worth capturing but not big enough to warrant a post of their own so I do tend to have a look back through what photographs I’ve taken and every couple of weeks they’ve grown into enough of a collection to ‘ramble’ about. We were a bit apprehensive about the virtual dinner party but it actually went really well and was a lovely evening ... that might be worth a post of its own as I did take a few pictures πŸ˜ƒ

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  2. So many things to comment on, I don't know where to start! The art class sounds interesting. Painting is something I keep wanting to do, but as I've never done any either it's rather daunting. I love the idea of the other you - a bit like the other me who has well-organised, clean and tidy house. I agree with you about treats - no point in skimping them! Have the real thing. Angel wings - what a beautiful idea, especially at the moment (so long as they're not like the angels in Philip Pullman's Dark Materials . . . ).

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    1. Thank you ... I think with regards the painting I may have to do a bit of a dummy run practice as I too find it pretty daunting and I want to end up with something that I’m not too ashamed of. I know what you mean about Phillip Pullmans angels ...these were a lot less sinister. Thanks for visiting and taking the time to comment πŸ˜ƒ

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Thanks for taking time to comment on my blog. I love to hear what people think about what Martin and I have been up to.